Poker Journal: 2011 FTP WSOP Fantasy Draft Tips and Tricks

With just one day to go before the official start to the 2011 World Series of Poker, many poker fans are scouring the web in search of last-minute tips to fill their rosters. This year’s draft is particularly tricky as many veteran players native to the U.S. are still feeling the after-effects of Black Friday and are unsure of their playing schedules.

I have to admit I enjoy playing the annual WSOP fantasy draft on Full Tilt and if truth be told, it has great promotional value since with a little luck, you can earn a substantial amount of Full Tilt Points usable for either their online store, or various satellites to big events. I haven’t had huge success in the past, but I usually come out with at least 2500 points for the minimal work I had put into it, not to mention a slew of freeroll entries. This year, however, I’ve put much more of an effort into research to avoid the silly mistakes I made last year.

Now, I certainly don’t consider myself a professional bookmaker and in reality, I’m only a casual poker player, but I did have one thing going for me when I chose my fantasy draft picks this year: I did my homework. I thought it would be worthwhile then to share some of the pearls of wisdom I have gathered while securing my choices.

First off, if you haven’t played the Full Tilt Fantasy WSOP before, here is how you can participate:

If you do not have a Full Tilt Poker account, click here to get started.

Load up your Full Tilt Poker client and click on the red cashier button at the top right hand corner

At the bottom of the Cashier box is a blue button entitled: My Promotions – click this

Click on the pictured link on the left hand side labeled Go To Fantasy Poker

NOTE: These tips are for the casual fantasy draft player and will assume you will be predominantly choosing one team for the entire duration of the contest. Obviously, the better strategy would be to pick specialists for all 58 events but the amount of research involved is so enormous, I’ll be concentrating on one solid team with a few minor edits for specific high profile events.

Pro Schedules

If you read just one tip to help you out, this will be a gold mine. Although I personally cannot stand the mindless chatter it creates, Twitter is an essential source for finding which players plan on attending WSOP and how many events they’ll play.

The number one mistake that the majority of fantasy pool players will make this year is choosing Eric Seidel (edit: Well, I guess now Ivey trumps Seidel in that department). “What?” you say. “How can I not pick the most profitable tournament player this year?” The answer is simple: Seidel already made a tweet saying his playing schedule will be drastically reduced and even recommends not to pick him. Over the course of 58 events, Seidel is not a good value. Instead, I would add him to specific events, like the Main Event, High Roller and The Poker Player’s Championship.

To help you start, here’s a list of recent tweet’s from various Full Tilt Pros: